Originally published via Armageddon Prose Substack:
In this, Our Sacred Democracy™, reporters don’t ask questions they are not granted permission to ask beforehand so that the correct response can be printed in bold 72-point font on a notecard for the alleged president to try to read.
So sayeth the Savior of Democracy™, Keeper of the Faith, the Holy Brandon Construct.
Via The Deadline (emphasis added):
“The White House Correspondents’ Association is objecting to the notion that reporters agreed to any restrictions on the types of questions they could ask of President Joe Biden at a press conference earlier today at the G7 summit in Italy.
Appearing at the press conference with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, Biden took a question from Bloomberg’s Josh Wingrove.
Wingrove asked the president if he would give his assessment of Hamas’ response to the latest ceasefire proposal. ‘Do you believe that they are trying to work towards a deal or is this response against a deal?’ Wingrove asked.
Biden responded, ‘I wish you guys would play by the rules a little bit. I’m here to talk about a critical situation in Ukraine and you asked me about another subject.’”
Recognizing that I’m probably preaching to the Armageddon Prose choir here, I would hope that we’ve long moved past the mythology of “Mr. Smith Goes to Washington” — the honest truth-teller with a spine who goes to Washington and sets everything right with his forthright devotion to public service or whatever.
This is nonsense; the politician has always been and will always be, with very few exceptions (like Ron Paul), a finger-in-the-wind sleazeball willing to do or say whatever he thinks will advance his personal interests (fame and money and invitations to cocktail parties, mainly).
The only meaningful check on the politician’s avarice, and the machinery of state that he represents, is popular will backed up, ultimately, by force if necessary. The latent threat of revolt must always be on the table in order for the government to act right, because it only responds to existential incentives.
In order for the citizenry to stay apprised of what the government is doing to it and in its name, however, there is a prerequisite: a free press that tells the truth about what it’s up to.
This is why, by no mere accident, the First Amendment includes protections of this free press. It is paramount to preventing tyranny, or remedying it as necessary.
But NBC Newswhore Kelly O’Donnell, president of the White House Correspondents’ Association, isn’t so explicit in her explanation of the centrality of a free press to freedom. Her version of why the free press matters is substantially watered-down, weak, and, in fact, totally pointless, as the government will continue running roughshod over First Amendment protections until it is met with a brick wall of resistance.
Continuing:
“NBC News’ Kelly O’Donnell, the president of the White House Correspondents’ Association, later issued a statement pushing back on the notion that reporters had agreed to a set of ‘rules’ on what could be asked.
‘The White House Correspondents’ Association believes it is in the public interest to make clear that at a presidential press conference, at home or abroad, there are no preconditions regarding question topics.
‘While the White House does determine the number of reporters the president will recognize, it is up to professional journalists to decide what to ask. Any leader may prefer that reporters ask only one question or ask only about a topic that is of most interest to the president or another world leader, but a free press functions independently.’”
Weak!
Sad!
Loser!
But, after all, that’s what she gets paid to be: a weak, sad loser posing as a newslady.
Ben Bartee, author of Broken English Teacher: Notes From Exile, is an independent Bangkok-based American journalist with opposable thumbs.
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